Lottery tickets are well known and widely sold and typically comprise a sheet material of paper or card stock on which is printed lottery information and various indicia for the playing of one or more games. Many such games are instant win type games where the player can play the game or games by scratching away an opaque latex coating to expose the game data.
Many attempts are being made at this present time to enhance the playing action of lottery tickets since instant win tickets necessarily must have a predetermined winning or losing condition. The tickets therefore need to provide sufficient pleasure and enjoyment for the player to encourage the purchase of further tickets but not to be so complicated that the average player is discouraged.
Much work is therefore being done to enhance the playing action by providing a series of steps that the player must undertake and modifying the conditions which are necessary for winning condition to be exposed.
Lottery tickets of this type are generally dedicated to a lottery situation in that the ticket carries substantially only information relating to the lottery and game data since the primary function is the winning and losing action of the player in the lottery game. However other fields of such tickets relate to promotional materials and fun games where there is often no monetary prize and the prizes concerned may relate merely to the promotion concerned, for example fast food or other consumer products. Other winning action may be merely of a fun nature for children where the winning of prizes in a gambling condition is unsuitable.
As an entirely different field in lottery and similar type games, there are many proposals for involvement of computers and other data communication devices by which the game playing is enhanced. However these arrangements move entirely away from the simple conventional printed ticket which is inexpensive and provides a simple playing action for the average player.
In one example Iowa Lottery authority in conjunction with Scientific Games have announced the release of a simple inexpensive computer device which carries a number of games and can be played by the player in the form of a simple calculator with keys and the like. This device is therefore entirely different from the conventional lottery ticket printed on a substrate and is directed to a different field of the market other than the average instant win ticket played by the average player.